Those who prefer bitter coffee can hide psychopathy with a sadistic tendency. This is the thesis of a study conducted at the University of Innsbruck and published in the journal "Appetite". The study suggests a correlation between sadistic or psychopathic personality traits and preferences for sugar-free coffee and other bitter foods.
The study was actually conducted in 2015, but has recently returned to attention, as quoted by the much-read "Reader's Digest" site, as a further study by Roosevelt University in Chicago deepened the analysis, significantly reducing the results.
Steven Meyers, professor of psychology, criticizes the Austrian study because it found only a "very small connection" between the preference for bitter things and the so-called Machiavellian traits. "The results have to be interpreted carefully - he said - and have to be reviewed several times by others before being credited."
Interviews with a thousand adults about their taste preferences have not been enough, not even four different personality tests, to assess Machiavellian traits such as narcissism, psychopathy, sadism, and aggression.
The Innsbruck team insists on a link between a preference for bitter foods (from turnips to tonic water, for example) and a "daily sadism" that involves pleasure in causing moderate levels of pain to others. And he believes that people who drink coffee with milk or sugar (and love sweets) tend to have more pleasant personality traits and a tendency towards sympathy, cooperation, kindness. Not only that: they suggest that associating bitter foods with psychopathic tendencies can become chronic and worsen over time.
On the other hand, the American staff led by Meyer underscores how taste preferences are influenced by our culture and personal experience, not just personality traits, and that in any case tend to change with age. When we are kids, for example, we hate vegetables, but when we grow up we love them (even, most people do not like coffee at all the first time they try it, he says).
Not to mention that those who like bitter coffee - he adds - can simply be more attentive to health and fitness, preferring to avoid the addition of sugars and fats.